


Every Broken Form Of You

by OnlyOneWoman



Series: A Simple Man [18]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Background stories, Canon Era, Canon has more or less committed suicide by now and I regret nothing, Caretaking, Chiropractic, Crack Relationships, Crack Treated Seriously, Cuddling & Snuggling, Eye Trauma, F/M, Friendship, Grief/Mourning, Healing, I never promised consistancy, Insecurity, Intimacy, Late at Night, Love, Lowbones, M/M, Matelots, Mild Sexual Content, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Not Canon Compliant, Onboard the Walrus, Out on the sea, POV Alternating, Pain, Past Relationship(s), Pirates are still bad at feelings, Pirates sticking together, Rape Aftermath, Silverdoon, Sorry Not Sorry, Sort Of, The Author Regrets Everything, The Author Regrets Nothing, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Weakness, a lot of it, at all, because I keep ruining them, but they're trying, injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-07
Updated: 2019-12-07
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:08:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21708736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OnlyOneWoman/pseuds/OnlyOneWoman
Summary: “You peel.”“Aye. Thank ye, Randall.”“We don’t like you.”“Ye don’ have to.”“We like him.”~Well, part 18 and Jesus, maybe I should get a life but well, someone has to make sure these idiots stay in line, right? I hope you'll enjoy this one, E_A_Phoenix and TuridTorkilsdottir. We're even getting some Flint POV!
Relationships: Billy Bones/Edward "Ned" Low, Captain Flint | James McGraw/Thomas Hamilton (mentioned) (past), Muldoon/John Silver, Ned Low/Eliza Marble (past)
Series: A Simple Man [18]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1530410
Comments: 4
Kudos: 6





	Every Broken Form Of You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rising_Phoenix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rising_Phoenix/gifts), [TuridTorkilsdottir](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TuridTorkilsdottir/gifts).



**Ned Low  
**The splashing sound of waves is soothing as is the familiar rocking but the other noises are a shock to his system as much as the sun is still hurting his eyes. Ned tries to block the shouting and laughters out and focus on the letters formed into words on the page before him. The thin veil of gunny fabrics lets enough light through for him to see the small forms his lover interprets with such an ease. Ned still needs to trace a finger underneath the lines.  
  
Being on a ship once again isn’t making much of a difference. Ned has never had any deeper connections to either his own vessels, the sea nor the men he’s sailed with and a part of him is still very much prepared to be gutted by these men he can barely see, let alone knows.  
  
“How are you finding it here, Captain?”  
  
The voice is the stern but not hostile one Ned has learned to reckognize as Captain Flint’s. It’s fairly quiet, the kind of voice that doesn’t need to be raised in order to make people listen. Ned knows because he has that skill as well, only in another tone. He looks up through the veil, not because he needs it but out of a respect he’s pretty sure Flint neither cares about nor fools himself to believe is there.  
  
“I’m find myself comfortable albeit somewhat useless, Captain.”  
  
Ned is pretty sure there’s half a smirk on the man’s face and Flint nods towards the galley.  
  
“There are always potatos to be peeled, Captain.”  
  
Right. Not really the kind of task Ned did as a Captain or one he finds particularly interesting, but he’s here because of his matelot and to make him look bad by assuming a position he’s not entitled to here, wouldn’t look good.  
  
He looks up at the Captain with a smile he hopes isn’t scornful or rude and nods.  
  
“Would ye mind if I sit here while peeling, Captain? Sun’s not as sharp in this spot.”  
“Not at all, Captain. I’ll let Randall hand you what you need.”  
“Thank ye.”  
  
With that, the somewhat incredulous ginger walks away and Ned momentarily tilts his ear upwards, hearing his matelot barking something to another crew member from the rigging. He can’t see him all too well, the well-built frame is shadowed by the veil but he’s there and that means Ned isn’t among strangers only.  
  
Steps in his direction and a loud thump of what appears to be a braided basket pulls Ned’s attention to the left and he reckognizes the two staring eyes too close to his face.  
  
“You peel.”  
“Aye. Thank ye, Randall.”  
“We don’t like you.”  
“Ye don’ have to.”  
“We like _him._ ”  
  
Ned rolls his eyes, because he must’ve had this particular conversation with this looney at least fifty goddamn times and he has to keep his temper in check.  
  
“I know, mate. I like’im too. Ye wan’ me to peel or not?”  
  
The basket lands on his lap and Ned bites down a growl because he’s still fucking sore. Another familiar sound of wood thumping heavily against the deck approaches.  
  
“That wasn’t very nice, Randall. Captain Low is our guest.”  
“He’s a thief.”  
“Oh, for fucks sake… We’re all _thieves_ here, Randall. Just because Betsy likes to nap on Captain Low’s lap, doesn’t mean he fucking stole her! She has _legs_! And stop throwing the potatos at him, Jesus Christ, he’s wounded and we still need supper so would you just let him do his job?”  
“I don’t _like_ him.”  
  
Ned is grateful for the veil because he can’t stop a grin. This… bickering is just too ridiculous and nothing like the kind of hostile fighting on _The Fancy._ It’s not always as friendly, this crew has their problems and those are primarly tied to the fact that no one seems to really like the Captain and the Captain doesn’t seem to like anyone either. Ned freely admits he’s not a skilled Captain himself, especially not in comparison to James Flint, but at least he was good at making his men feel good about themselves.  
  
Silver sits down on a stool put there for his leg’s sake and sighs.  
  
“Randall… You like Billy, right?”  
“I like him.”  
“And you like me? A little bit, a least?”  
“I like you… thief.”  
  
Ned chuckles from the little snark and the quartermaster shakes his head, smiling.  
  
“Well… I like you too, Randall, and _Billy_ likes _Captain Low_ quite a lot. And _I_ happen to like Captain Low as well. And since _you_ like both me _and_ Billy, then maybe you could try and be nice to Captain Low… For our sake?”  
  
A grunt that could be both a yes an no and a fuck you, leaves the cook and then he disappears below decks again.  
  
“You do know the reason he doesn’t like you, is because Betsy keeps sleeping in your lap at midday.”  
“Wha…? The bloody cat?”  
  
The one-legged quartermaster snickers.  
  
“Betsy usually doesn’t like _anyone_ but Randall so this is a serious matter, Captain. My friend is quite hurt and that’s when he starts throwing things at you. Like potatos and angry glares. Oh, and he spits in the porridge too.”  
“Ye’ve all lost yer minds, haven’t ye?”  
  
He can almost spot a smile from the other side of the veil and Silver shrugs.  
  
“I’m happy to have my matelot scream at me like a banshee, we have a cook who spits in the porridge when he’s pissed off, our Captain does his best to make everyone as uncomfortable as he is and our first mate has decided to bring along his matelot, who happens to be the infamous Ned Low, on our ship to peel potatos and make Randall jealous by stealing attention from the cat so yes, Captain Low, we’ve most likely collectively lost our minds here.”  
  
**Captain Flint**  
He only accepted the plea because it’s just too much of a nuisance to handle both Silver and Billy at the same time. The little shit and the big idiot, both of them fucking annoying on their own and together they’re positively insufferable. Of course, it’s a good thing that Muldoon is back and that Billy no longer barricates himself onshore to play the good samaritan. At least Captain Low is no land lubber or one for snooping around or disturbing Flint’s day with stupid comments.  
  
He’s certainly not the company he’d choose though. Basically illiterate, ugly and scrawny and with just this… feral, almost vile sense around him that reminds Flint all too much of what kind of company he’s forced to put up with these days – and how it’s like being with a different species than the people he once used to share pleasant conversations in salons with. These men aren’t of his kind, but who are?  
  
Flint lets his gaze sweep over the ship. DeGroot is firmly by the rudder, Billy is up in the riggings and Silver sits with that ragged bag of bones Billy for some reason considers someone of worth to him. James McGraw would have turned away, Thomas Hamilton would have reminded him not to judge and Flint just tries to understand. Captain Ned Low is one of the ugliest men Flint has seen and he’s seen plenty of them. The only thing more strange than seeing Billy show that kind of interest in anyone what so ever, is that it’s directed towards this absolutely despicable piece of shit. But the crew accept his presence, he’s trying to make himself useful and despite being a Captain, albeit only to the name, he’s peeling potatos without any visible resistance.  
  
_They’re men, human beings just like we, James._  
  
Thomas was more than that, Flint thinks. He was an _ideal_ embodied and the only thing he’d be able to grasp and mirror himself in with these crooks, is their shamed and forbidden love, a thing the magistrate and nobles and the kings and common alike would look at with far more disgust than the killing and stealing.  
  
The care Silver has for the gunner is easier to understand than the subject of Billy’s affections. Muldoon is, as far as pirates are concerned, a fairly decent , simple man who doesn’t take pleasure in torture and blood. He’s annoying but so is Silver and he keeps the quartermaster in line – exactly how he manages that, is a thing Flint prefers not to find out.  
  
Captain Low, on the other hand, is a…  
_  
Monster?_  
  
Flint has no time for more contemplations over the man he once was and the one he became. Billy has always been a bit odd with his lack of interactions with lovers, often the subject of teasing from the crew but never in a malicious way. If anything, Flint would’ve guessed the girls and mollies being too… well, much of whores to the first mate, who maybe was the kind of man secretly wanting a wife to come home to instead of exchanging momentary pleasure for coin. Neither has he shown any interest in men, a least not openly.  
  
Billy is a handsome man, but Flint still remembers the starved, whipped and brutalized kid they found during a hunt, who would bite and hiss like a feral animal, scared to death for anything walking on two legs. And he’s never been of the most violent kind, never caring for blood and death needlessly and so the idea of him taking a liking to Captain Low like this is… well, surprising.  
  
And Jesus Christ, the man is so _ugly._  
  
**Billy Bones**  
The veil is moving softly in the wind. The sun is hot and half of the men are taking their midday meal on deck. Water, fish stew and the usual tacks. The men are talking but not as loud, due to the heat. That was one of the things Billy found strange when he came to Flint’s crew, the fact that the men could laugh and yell and talk while on duty without being beaten for it. Had he seen a weak and sickly man on deck with a veil, getting the same rations as the others, he’d been shocked.  
  
His lover has become softer since the doc cracked his bones right. Less sharp in his comments, less hard on himself when he’s struggling with the pain and poor eye sight. Billy finds himself softening in the face too when watching him.  
  
The man sharing his bunk is so beautiful. They don’t have sex yet, it’s just not the right time for many reasons and the lack of privacy onboard isn’t even the major reason. But despite the wounds, the hollowness, the veil and the uneven hair, Ned is still beautiful and when Billy hands him the ration, sitting down next to him with a shirt wrapped around his head against the heat, Ned gives a small smile and puts the fishing net he’s mending to the side.  
  
“Ye’re sure this aint too much?”  
  
Billy just shakes his head, chuckling as he sits down next to his matelot.  
  
“No one gets less food than anyone else onboard, unless it’s an extreme situation.”  
“Aint doing anything tha’ requires a full ration.”  
“You’re healing.”  
  
It’s hard for Ned to accept help. Even more so than it is for Silver, but of course, this isn’t Ned’s crew and the only reason he’s allowed here, is because he’s Billy’s matelot. The crew doesn’t dislike him, he’s not causing trouble and he’s doing what he can to be of help, but still, it’s an unusual situation and Billy understands the feeling of weakness, of disadvantage and being a burden relying on the mercy of others. Silver probably understands it even better.  
  
Ned dips the hard tack in the stew to soften it. They’re not too bad, not filled with maggots and the man has good teeth. Billy looks over the ship, at his mates eating and talking. Not all of them are talking, DeGroot is known for keeping to himself at mealtimes and the old man is sitting by the rudder, ready to give the Captain a hand if needed. Silver, of course, sits with Muldoon but they’re not in a corner to themselves, but talking to Dobbs and Dr. Howell.  
  
Billy is grateful for all the help from the crew, but especially from the doc and Joji. The mute, Chinese man has been a good teacher to Howell despite the lack of spoken words and Ned’s body is so much better now. Not healed, but a major part of the pain and discomfort is gone and to Billy, who’s become good at reading his matelot, the difference is all but complete.  
  
He watches the stiff fingers, no longer wrapped with splints, dip the tack again. The joints crack, but he’s moving them according to Howell’s orders. He can walk too, not very good but enough not to be dependent on Billy’s help all the time.  
  
Ned looks out over the ocean, at least his head is in that direction and he’s getting a somewhat serene expression over the mouth. It’s a sort of bittersweet view, Billy thinks. He’s so grateful for having him here, Christ, for having him at all, for Ned still wanting him despite what’s happened. He’d like to ask him what it is he’s picturing behind the blindfold, but he doesn’t. They’re not alone, after all.  
  
His wayward lover has a daughter. An eight years old little girl living somewhere in Boston with her mother’s sister. Maybe she’s alive and well, maybe not, and perhaps Ned prefers not to know, to spare himself mourning over yet another lost love. All Billy knows about her, is her name, her age and that she has grey eyes like her mother.  
  
**John Silver**  
The crew grants them allowance because of Muldoon’s presumed death and unexpected return. It’s not that the men don’t fuck in their bunks if they’re lucky enough to have a matelot onboard, but it’s an unspoken rule that one keeps it discrete and preferably in the darkness, for practical reasons as well as those of decency.  
  
That’s why John is laying on his back down the carter cargo space, with a couple of blankets and a pillow as support, while Muldoon is straddling him, not yet lowering down to start the actual fucking. The gunner is kissing him, in his usual fierce and almost brutal manner, the old force in his hands returned and John loves it, the familarity of it, of the first touch he could accept without feeling sick after the loss of his leg. The pace is slowing after a while, the lips meeting his own turning softer, less violent and when John feels the large palm cradling around his neck, he tilts his head into it, letting himself become lax and trusting.  
  
Muldoon works both their shirts off. In the beginning, John didn’t understand the necessity of it, just humoured the gunner, but the fucking truly feels different with the touch of warm skin instead of calico fabrics and he shivers when feeling their naked torsos coming together. Muldoon is a lover, not just getting himself off and it took time to get used to the way he’d touch John all over and not just dive straight into the fucking.  
  
His matelot looks so strangely sweet above him, his hands warm and wanting in the way they wander and John widens his thighs to come closer, to feel that delicious friction from simply rubbing together. He sighs when feeling Muldoons hand moving to the clothed crack.  
  
“We don’t have time for that…”  
“I know…”  
  
A smile, the teasing kind John can’t get enough of, at least in private. It does something to him, this particular curving of Muldoon’s mouth, the glimpse in his eyes. A playfulness beneath the grumpy surface that’s John’s. Only John’s.  
  
They quickly unfasten their belts, scooting down their breeches a bit and Muldoon spits in his hand before fisting them both together in a firm, callous grip and John bites back a low moan deep down his throat. Somehow rubbing cocks like this feels even more… naked and exposed than taking cock up the ass and John doesn’t understand why. Perhaps it’s because none of them can pretend they’re with a woman.  
  
Their muffled grunts follow the pleasure creeping up through John’s body. Being with Muldoon, has forced him to accept being looked at and touched in a whole new way, to translate lingering gazes and hesistant hands not into disgust or pity, but lust. Muldoon isn’t afraid of touching him, doesn’t handle him like a fragile thing or a weakness to take advantage of.  
  
“John…”  
“What?”  
  
The hand comes back around his neck and his cock is weeping in Muldoon’s grip when the gunner looks straight at him, brushing lips over his mouth.  
  
“I’m here, John. _I’m_ here…”  
  
Brown, warm eyes. _Don’t slip away from me. I came back, so don’t you dare leaving me now._ Muldoon’s thumb rubs hard over the slit on John’s cock and he moans, is back already, not disappering into himself and he’s missed that even more than the fucking or the countability or the angry voice, because this is how the gunner always manages to pull him back from the edge of those depths Flint is constantly threatening to push him into.

And when John falls, spilling over their cojoined hands, Muldoon’s still weakened body holds him steady, the brightness of his eyes a beacon in the darkness that is Flint’s rage and John’s own memories. And he looks down at the kind features, because kindness without an ulterior motive is still so difficult to find in this world and in moments like this, John thinks he could spend hours just watching it glimmer in his matelot’s satisfied face.  
  
For a sliver of a moment, John pretends he’s beautiful too.  
  
**Ned Low**  
Night comes as a longed for friend, a cradle of ease, mercy for the one who deserves it as well as those who don’t. The mute swordmaster stands guard tonight. As on every pirate ship, there’s a rotating schedule no one except those of extremely poor sight get away from entirely. Billy most likely has a few nights waiting, since he’s allowed to get away for now.  
  
It’s a calm night that doesn’t bring too much of wind, just a small breeze and sitting on quarterdeck, leaned back against Billy’s frame, isn’t the worst way to spend a night at sea. Or on shore. Joji’s silence is welcomed too, Ned feels gratitude towards the man because since cracking his bones, his body has improved a lot in terms of pain and mobility.  
  
Ned hums quietly when Billy takes his left hand and starts massaging it, the palm and the back, every finger, knuckle and even the nails, a firm pinch on each of them that seems to increase the blood flow. They’re not talking, not making any sounds apart from the cracking coming from the joints and their breaths are calm and even. It’s become a nightly routine, Billy holding him in one way or the other, slowly working out some tension in Ned’s hands and arms.  
  
The giant man lets go and slides upwards, the left onto Ned’s left shoulder, the right one heavy on top of his head. The cracking sounds like something is breaking but it’s the opposite and Ned feels the relief spread when his bones fall back in their natural positions and makes a quiet whimper, tilting into Billy’s chin as the pain melts away.  
  
This is the time of the day when Ned can look without the veil yet he closes his eyes now. He knows it’s Billy, can tell it not only from the forms of his muscular body, but from the scent of him, the breaths and little sighs. He feels the broad palms, the steady chest, those almost abnormally huge arms and Ned’s mind doesn’t play tricks on him, it know who’s holding him and wants more. Last time they tried, it didn’t work and Billy’s hand is staying above Ned’s belt, circling his belly and chest in smooth, steady movements. There’s no rush there, no impatience and instead of slipping down, Billy takes his other hand up to Ned’s face, turning it a little and kisses him.  
  
It feels good, feels right and Ned can sense how his lover holds back, how he’s aware of the risks but not deterred by them. Not disgusted with the weakness Ned is displaying nor aiming to get his cock wet. Not even Eliza touched him like this, wanting to get to know every inch of his form. But Billy does. The palms are sliding across all of Ned’s upper body, soon getting beneath the shirt and Jesus, it’s still so… new.  
  
Fingers are tracing Ned’s ribs carefully, the tips light as feathers on their path across his skin. It’s the way one touches a woman, or a girl old enough to take to bed yet not fully a woman. It’s the touch of lust-filled patience, of a longing not hidden but only kept in a leash. Kisses, chaste and soft, nibbled lightly into the side of his neck, the skilled steps of feet knowing just where to go – and when to turn still. It’s how Ned once kissed Eliza when courting her, when she still wouldn’t let his hands undo the bonnet.  
  
She taught him this kind of touch, how lust could be there without rush, without neither a predator nor a prey. The first time he had her, she was smiling, stilling his hands by putting them firmly onto her breast.  
  
_Slow down, boy. I’m not a whore in it for coin, nor some wife cheating on her husband in a back alley._  
  
He fell for her right there and then. Her sense of humor, her sharp tongue and witty mind. The lack of shame for her needs and the way she looked at him and the way she wouldn’t let him see her hair until their wedding night. How she guided his hand up between her legs and would stroke him in kind but not going further, because she wanted to be his wife and if he wanted her, he’d have to wait.  
  
He wanted her and so he waited. The one thing he never took as he pleased was that.  
  
Eliza was beautiful and he was not yet maimed, broken and revolting. Billy now kisses him, touches and looks at him like Ned would at Eliza. With something akin to awe in front of a form of beauty he didn’t know could be his. He can feel the man’s heartbeats speeding up onto his back, but the hands don’t wander off and it’s almost unbearable, being treated with such… respect.  
  
His wife… The woman who became his wife, Ned treated her with what respect he found within him, coming mostly from his mother and for some lucky reason, it was enough for her. That he not only provided for her and their daughter, but that he didn’t gamble away their money, didn’t hit them and didn’t take other women to bed. That he didn’t just take his marital rights like some brute, but cared about her pleasure as well. It never even occurred to him not to and while he was never beautiful, Ned can’t recall Eliza ever looking at his face with disgust.  
  
In her eyes he was, not beautiful, Ned can’t believe that, but at least desireble. She got to know him and that’s how he became a thing of desire for her. By the way he looked at her, how he kept silent about them fucking before getting married and sparing her the shame of ridicule and scorn. He didn’t spill inside her before their wedding night and when he did, she wasn’t appalled. Some time later, she gave him a new kind of smile, telling that she would bring forth a child, maybe a son, and her belly swelled as did Ned’s pride.  
  
Elizabeth is the only innocent thing Ned has helped creating, that didn’t end up dead because of him. A thing of beauty, even, and Ned has to will the memory away to not break. He’s already broken in so many ways and places as it is and the giant man who’s hands are cradling him, is holding him, not like father told him the unnatural creatures in dresses who were hanged and castrated at the square would do: in sick and weak lust, yerning to be women and therefor deserved to be treated like such.  
  
Richard, Ned remembers, had asked later why women had to be hanged. He could not see that the filled out dresses weren’t real, but bags of sand tied to look like tits and that the long hair on the men’s heads weren’t their own, but glued on horsehair. Women were weak, lesser beings and for a man to lust for another man, was not only to be unnatural and degenerated, but to yearn for weakness, to give up his God given right to power over a wife and children and what was such a creature deserving of, if not an humiliating death?  
  
Ned searches for his lover’s hand. There’s nothing humiliating, unmanly or weak in the way he loves Billy. If Ned isn’t sure of anything else, at least he’s got no doubts about that part of his nature, degenerated or not.  
  
**Billy Bones**  
Is there any right way, any kind of manual as to love a man _as_ a man? To have him for real, not just as the second best, as an opportunity for mutual relief and company between ports. Billy isn’t at all unused to men fucking, only with men not caring the slightest for women.  
  
And yet, that’s the kind of man he is, always has been and if he was to say Ned alone wasn’t enough to satisfy him, at sea or on shore, he’d be lying. Silver and Muldoon occasionally have women, either the two of them together or separately, as other men in Nassau with that kind of yerning. It’s not a thing of ridicule or disproof and definitely not illegal. Hell, they have their own type of marriage for God’s sake, with vows and rings and all.  
  
Love, as far as Billy is concerned, is a thing of beauty no matter the form. What was it Ned said when they first shared a bed?  
  
_It’s an uncertain world, Mr. Manderly. Best to live in the now.  
  
_The past is written in stone, the future unknown and the now holds, for the first time in Billy’s soon thirty years of life, the content of what he thought could only happen between a man and a woman. That he simply wasn’t that kind of man, the sort to be married or share a bond like that. It’s not that he’s not had his fancies, his urges, he’s just never been… in love before.  
  
He can see, from an outside view, how it would be impossible to see the beauty in this beast that is Ned Low. And hell, he’s not a vain man, but he’s not unaware of how women and also certain men are looking at him. Billy knows that stature and swelling muscles often attracts that kind of attention and that a man like Ned, lithe, not very tall and with a blind eye decorated with a scar, usually isn’t the primar subject of longing looks.  
  
But oh God, when holding Ned right here and now, there are just no words for what Billy feels, when facing the beauty only a lover or a husband would see in a form as broken as this.  
  
Ned is tired, the way he becomes heavy is a tell-tale sign and Billy looks up to spot Joji who’s on night’s watch, getting a smile that’s not a usual sight from their swordsmaster. That’s a good thing with being a pirate, Billy supposes. To become used to the unusual. To be free not only of the chains of tyranny, but from those trying to put a leash around your heart and soul as well.  
  
And yet, what is love, if not a leash, a velvet noose you gladly choose to tie, sometimes with the help on the one holding your heart. A blind eye seemingly looking at you, with an uncertain smile and the hand no longer holding a cutlass, searching for your face, turning it down for you to see the brokenness.  
  
That hoarse yet gentle whisper, partly drowned by rocking waves, dropping an answer you never dared to wish for, and certainly not expected to hear.  
  
“I love ye too.”


End file.
